Eventually, even thick skulls like mine get the point.

Pretty much all summer long, the team here at All Star Charts has been mentioning Enphase Energy $ENPH as a strong outperformer that is on the verge of a potential epic breakout. During today's internal Analyst meeting, the team agreed that now is finally the time to get involved.

JC and I did a video on a possible trade in $ENPH ahead of today's Fed Reserve Interest Rates announcement. We did just get into it moments ago. Enjoy this video to get a great idea of why we like this trade and how we'll play it:

A Bull Phase for Enphase Energy? @allstarcharts https://t.co/INbp6CH827

— Sean McLaughlin, NLD 📈 (@chicagosean) September 21, 2022

From the desk of Willie Delwiche.

Key Takeaway: With last month’s rally behind us and the June lows quickly approaching, investor attitudes are beginning to sour. Bears on the II survey now outnumber bulls for the first time since mid-July, and the Consensus bulls continue to decline. Despite this pessimism, investors have been slow to take action. They have kept equity exposure elevated and equity ETFs actually saw $20B of inflows last week (after the two preceding weeks saw $11B of outflows). Increased pessimism at this point is the most significant sentiment risk for stocks. Investors (and their portfolios) have been bruised by a perceived lack of alternatives to stocks but with short-term bond yields now at their highest levels that could be changing.

Sentiment Report Chart of the Week: Safe Havens Haven’t Been Safe

Anything can happen over the final 3+ months of the year, but so far 2022 has been a disappointing year on many fronts for most investors. The portfolio drawdown experienced by the average...

This is the video recording of our September 21, 2022, Inside Scoop Weekly Strategy Session.

We've adjusted a position in the Paid-to-Play portfolio today:

There's no denying our rather cautious approach to crypto markets as of late.

Bitcoin's hanging on by a thread. And the broader trend in risk markets has been lower, in a messy fashion.

So, given this backdrop, what's to be said about crypto-related equities?

Markets trade in cycles.

We've seen these cycles play out over and over again throughout many decades.

But how do we profit from it all?

Well, for me, I like to use seasonal tendencies to help put the current market environment into context.

It's not about today and tomorrow, and it's not about next year. Where are we right now?

Our Cycle Composite does a good job of helping us put together a road map for this market's cycle.

On the left side of this chart we have the 2021 seasonal trends and on the right we have the 2022 trends.

Last year's composite includes every year since 1950, every post election year since 1950 and every year ending in 1, to include the decennial cycle. Look how closely last year's actual results mirrored the composite:

The most significant insider activity on today's list comes in a Form 4 filing by Douglas A. Pepper, director of Braze Inc $BRZE.

Pepper reported a purchase worth roughly $14 million.

This is the video recording of the September 2022 Mid-month Conference Call.

We discussed:

• What's the Bear Case?
• One of worst starts to year for 60/40 portfolio in history
• The impact of the US Dollar on Stocks
• No lows list peaked 3 months ago
• Best time to buy stocks in the 4 year cycle
• Bearish sentiment persists
• ARKK and Biotech stopped falling in May
• S&P500 stuck below resistance 4100-4200
• European Banks show relative strength
• Midstream Stocks Breaking out - the full list
• Corn, Soybeans and Wheat with huge bases
• Silver bullish divergence vs Gold
• Other Emerging Markets outpacing China
• Small-cap Industrials stocks that are breaking out
• 1-yr yield highest roc in 40 years
• The Flippening Is Real
• List of best trade ideas

From the Desk of Ian Culley @IanCulley

The US Dollar Index $DXY is on cruise control with nothing ahead but an open road.

The few obstacles that stood in its way are falling to the wayside. That’s right – the handful of commodity currencies that have refused to roll over during the past six months are beginning to slip.

Before we get to these fresh breakdowns, let’s set the scene with two currencies that have been anything but resilient – the euro and the British pound.

From the desk of Willie Delwiche.

Key Takeaways:

• Inflation fight being waged on a global basis
• Rate expectations have been unanchored 
• Effects of tighter policy already being felt

Higher rates and tighter central banks are a global phenomenon this year. In fact, the Fed is one of a dozen central banks meeting this week and a majority are expected to raise rates, again. Both the breadth and intensity of rate hikes are pretty much unprecedented. That doesn’t even get into quantitative tightening in the US. The Fed’s balance sheet is 10-times as large as it was two decades ago and has only begun to shrink (the 26-week change just turned negative last month).

Expectations for the Fed are drifting higher. Futures have now priced in 100 basis points of tightening this year than the Fed thought would be necessary when it released its last dot plot (in June). Tomorrow’s updated economic projections and expected path of rates will receive at least as much scrutiny as an actual rate hike that gets announced. 

Stocks are struggling...

The next new position in our Paid-to-Play portfolio is:

Yesterday, we framed this market action in a rather dramatic tone, arguing that Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies are staring into the abyss.

With Bitcoin testing its year-to-date lows, there's little in the way preventing crypto assets from experiencing yet another significant leg down in the penultimate stages of this year.

So, alongside the commentary in yesterday's letter, we want to approach this market from two angles and let money flow dictate our execution.

Let's dive in.

The largest insider transaction on today's list is a Form 4 filing by the CEO of Ivanhoe Electric Inc $IE, who reported a purchase worth roughly $3.3 million.

The only 13G on our list today was filed by Boxer Capital, LLC. The investment firm revealed an initial 5.70% ownership stake in SpringWorks Therapeutics $SWTX.

The stock we're looking at this week is part of the Automobile sector.

We retired our "Five Bull Market Barometers" in 2020 to make room for a new weekly post that's focused on the three most important charts for the week ahead.

This is that post, so let's jump into this week's edition.

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @sstrazza

This is one of our favorite bottom-up scans: Follow the Flow.

In this note, we simply create a universe of stocks that experienced the most unusual options activity — either bullish or bearish, but not both.

We utilize options experts, both internally and through our partnership with The TradeXchange. Then, we dig through the level 2 details and do all the work upfront for our clients.

Our goal is to isolate only those options market splashes that represent levered and high-conviction, directional bets.

We also weed out hedging activity and ensure there are no offsetting trades that either neutralize or cap the risk on these unusual options trades.

What remains is a list of stocks that large financial institutions are putting big money behind.

And they’re doing so for one reason only: because they think the stock is about to move in...

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza.

Welcome back to our latest Under The Hood columne, where we'll cover all the action for the week ended September 16, 2022. This report is published bi-weekly and rotated with our Minor Leaguers column.

What we do here is analyze the most popular stocks during the week and find opportunities to either join in and ride these momentum names higher, or fade the crowd and bet against them.

We use a variety of sources to generate the list of most popular names.

There are so many new data sources available that all we need to do is organize and curate them in a way that shows us exactly what we want: a list of stocks that are seeing an unusual increase in investor interest.

Watch this video for a behind-the-scenes look at our process.

Whether we’re measuring increasing interest based on large institutional...

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Our Top 10 Charts Report was just published.

In this weekly note, we highlight 10 of the most important charts or themes we're currently seeing in asset classes around the world.

New Lows for Big Tech

When it comes to the most important stocks, it’s all about tech. Mega cap technology companies dominate the US indexes and are in just about everyone's portfolio. The chart below illustrates just how paramount their performance is for the broader market. We have overlaid the relative trend between technology stocks and the S&P 500 with the Nasdaq 100 on absolute terms.

While the chart shows less than a year of data, the correlation between the two is consistently strong throughout all of history. This makes perfect sense as technology stocks represent roughly half of the weighting in the Nasdaq. Not only did we see new lows in a growing number of large cap tech stocks last week, but the group also made new 52-week relative lows at the index level. This kind of relative weakness tells us we should expect further downside for the market’s largest stocks. If that’s the case, the major...

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Check out this week's Momentum Report, our weekly summation of all the major indexes at a Macro, International, Sector, and Industry Group level.

By analyzing the short-term data in these reports, we get a more tactical view of the current state of markets. This information then helps us put near-term developments into the big picture context and provides insights regarding the structural trends at play.

Let's jump right into it with some of the major takeaways from this week's report:

* ASC Plus Members can access the Momentum Report by clicking the link at the bottom of this post.

Macro Universe:

• This week, our macro universe was negative, as 89% of our list closed lower with a median return of -2.90%.
• The Volatility Index $VIX was the winner, closing with a 15.40% gain.
• The biggest loser was Dow Jones Transports $DJT, with a weekly loss of -8.79%.
• There was a 3% drop in the percentage of assets on our list within 5% of their 52-week highs – currently at 6%.
• 11% of our macro list made fresh 4-week highs....

Key Takeaway:

• Thrust but verify.
• Fed up with higher rates.
• Worst six month stretch ever has investors in an exceedingly bad mood.

The June index-level lows are holding for now, but the response to the breadth and momentum thrusts that accompanied the summer rally has been somewhere between uninspiring and historically bad. On the one hand, the S&P 500 was essentially flat in the month following July 28 breadth thrust signal based on a surge in the percentage of stocks making new 20-day highs and even now is not outside the range of what has been seen in the past. The mid-August signal based on surging 40-day momentum, however, has been followed by unprecedented weakness.

These thrusts typically are evidence that conditions are improving and a sustainable rally is at hand. But that is usually verified by longer-term trends turning higher and consistently seeing more stocks make new highs than new lows...